


Lay Me Down To Crawl // If I Lose Everything In The Fire

by gimmefire



Category: Formula 1 RPF
Genre: M/M, Misery, Outdoor Sex, Voyeurism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-30
Updated: 2015-04-02
Packaged: 2018-03-20 07:47:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,539
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3642339
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gimmefire/pseuds/gimmefire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>"Is difficult to find a driver like me."</i> In the aftermath of the 2012 United States Grand Prix, Rob and Felipe seek out celebration and solace in downtown Austin. Neither one proves easy to find.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Lay Me Down To Crawl

**Author's Note:**

> Rob's POV, Beta by Mackem. Titles are taken from Placebo's "The Crawl" and Green Day's "Last Night On Earth", fic features a lyric from Florence and the Machine's "Shake It Out".
> 
> Preceding the Grand Prix, Ferrari deliberately incurred a grid penalty for Felipe - who had outqualified teammate Fernando - by breaking a seal on his gearbox, dropping him five places on the grid and elevating Fernando one place to the clean side of the grid, to better serve the latter's championship fight. Fernando and Felipe finished third (from seventh) and fourth (from eleventh) respectively. Felipe's emotional state at the subsequent Brazilian Grand Prix is also something to bear in mind when reading this.

 

\- It's a fine romance, but it's left me so undone -

 

_We go out, we drink like a pair of teenagers, and it always ends badly._

That was what he'd said. Or something close to it, anyway. Not so long back, Rob had taken part in an interview for the Ferrari website, some Mr and Mrs type thing with Felipe. He'd been asked how they celebrate a victory.

_We go out, drink like teenagers._

Well, this was a celebration. Of sorts. Not a victory, not _the_ victory, not the laurels and the champagne and the trophy and all that other bullshit, but...

_Always ends badly._

It was a celebration. It was. It had to be.

 

Rob had dreaded the decision that came on Saturday evening, and knew he'd never win if he fought it. He made his displeasure clear, he raged about only being valued when it suited the other side of the garage, he raged about Felipe not doing as good a job as Rob knows he's capable of earlier in the season, about himself not doing a better job, all the fucking mistakes made in Malaysia; impotent anger roiled inside him, and he raged.

To himself. In his hotel room that night. Glaring in silence at the ceiling from a too empty bed.

He raged inwardly until he gave himself a headache, until it balled up in his stomach like a tumour, like a fist.

There is a championship to win.

There is a championship to win.

We are here to win.

We are. As a team.

 

A beer or two on Sunday night in downtown Austin goes some way towards soothing his ills, a top off to Felipe's outstanding race performance. The same appears to be the case for Felipe himself; the Brazilian is three sheets to the wind and will probably be about nine or ten by the end of the night. Rob isn't deliberately keeping an eye on him in this overcrowded club, but he has the inherent ability to draw Rob's attention, especially when he's sauntering around the dance floor with a pinched smile on his face, swinging his hips when he dances and getting his hands all over several other men. Felipe knocks back the rest of his current drink and ambles over to the bar to immediately replace it, occupying a slim space beside the incumbent world champion, who of course has his own celebration tonight. He slings his arm around Sebastian's shoulders and tugs him closer to speak into his ear over the booming noise of the DJ. Sebastian laughs and mirrors the motion of Felipe's arm, linking the two of them together, giving his shoulder a squeeze.

Rob watches, and he hates the fact that he can't make himself stop. He's struggling to put a name to what he feels.

 

Fortunately or not, Rob does not play the lurker for much longer; Felipe has his fresh drink and, after patting Sebastian on the shoulder and allowing his hand to slide down his back, he turns and sees Rob looking at him. For a long moment, he merely returns his gaze, chin slightly raised, eyelids slightly heavy when he blinks, that tense smile... Then he licks his lips and comes over, direct and purposeful. As he gets closer, moving out of the path of a dazzling disco light, it becomes clear that there's a fire smouldering away in his eyes. It isn't lust.

"You're a bit drunk," Rob comments when Felipe is in front of him.

"You think I shouldn't be?" There's a small smile playing on Felipe's lips, but his response is sharp and he fixes Rob with an intense look. Waiting for an answer.

Rob holds up his hands. "No judgement here mate, you know that."

Felipe's gaze is drawn to the remaining dregs in Rob's beer, and he offers his own up. Rob accepts, his swerve away from a potential argument not having tamped down the fire in Felipe's gaze; instead it fixes on his mouth as it closes around the collar of the bottle. Felipe sucks his bottom lip into his mouth as he brazenly stares.

"I want to fuck you," Felipe says when he takes the beer back, ensuring his fingers brush Rob's while he does so. "As soon as possible. Here." He points at the floor between their feet in case he isn't being clear enough.

Rob does not immediately respond. Desire unfurls within him, caught by the burn in storm dark eyes, and he bites his bottom lip. He looks at Felipe levelly. "Is that right?"

Slowly, deliberately, Felipe hooks that pointing finger into the waistband of Rob's jeans and pulls him in until their hips touch, beckoning him to lean down.

"Are you going to tell me what to do?" he asks against Rob's ear, voice low and brimming with challenge. At that moment, Rob can't find it in himself to back down.

He looks Felipe up and down. "No."

Felipe slides his hand around the back of Rob's neck and pulls him down into a deep kiss, one that Rob gives little resistance to at first. He falls into it, he allows himself to fall into it, and he's happy to disappear in the taste and rhythm until reality and common sense crash into it all.

"Not here," Rob says firmly when he abruptly breaks away, eyes casting about for onlookers. When his gaze returns to Felipe, it's there, plain to see - the resentment, the derision that had been stewing away just below the surface of Felipe's demeanour all night, risen up and bloomed dark in chocolate eyes. A deep frown beds into his brow and he turns away without a word. Rob clenches his jaw and resists the whipcrack urge to shout after his driver, because it wouldn't help. Nothing does.

 

He goes outside for a smoke out of European habit more than anything else, but also because the cool night air might clear his head. He wanders away from the noise of nightlife and the other Europeans also apparently unable to break the habit around the side of the red brick building, into a small park area, scornfully ignoring the no smoking sign and taking to a relatively narrow gravel path that undulates between the thick bushes and slender saplings. The cigarette doesn't relax him the way it usually does as he slowly paces. He's thinking about the future, near and not so near, he's thinking about decisions to make, he's thinking about his driver, his team, he's thinking about that clenched fist in his stomach. He's _thinking_.

Maybe he'll give Lucy a ring. What time would it be over there? He checks his watch.

Fucking hell. Never mind.

He hears footsteps behind him when he's halfway through his second cigarette. He half turns to allow them past on the path and realises it's Felipe, who slows down as he passes Rob, giving him a hard, lingering look. There's that _challenge_ again. More immediately concerning than that, however, is the a dark smudge of something under Felipe's nose that Rob doesn't remember seeing before.

Felipe slows to a stop a few yards away and turns back to face Rob. They stare at one another in simmering silence but for the noise emanating from the nearby bars and clubs, and it gives Rob enough time to recognise that the mark under Felipe's nose is a streak of blood. Dread flashes in his stomach and he frowns. "What did you do to your nose?"

Felipe reflects that frown and swipes at his nose with the back of his hand. The frown quickly dissipates on inspection of his blood smeared hand, and he waves it with dismissive anger before gravel crunches under his heels as he turns and moves out of sight, out of the yellowish pool of lamp light, disappearing between a clump of neat bushes. "Felipe!" Rob exclaims, sharp and irritated and not caring enough to hide it anymore, but it's to no avail. He takes one more short, angry drag on his cigarette and drops it to the ground, putting it out with a twist of his foot before he follows Felipe into the darkness.

Rob has barely come to a complete stop in the semi-but-not-really-secluded greenery before Felipe's hands are on him, pulling him down for a ravenous kiss. He grunts and Felipe groans, fingers tightening in his hair until it hurts. They stagger as one because Felipe pulls at him, other hand fisted into the side of his shirt, pulling him back and down, ever down, and it's not until Rob's legs finally buckle and his knees hit the ground that Felipe growls _here_ against his mouth and he feels the hot rush of desire.

"Here," Felipe says again, quiet and dangerous, clambering into his lap with his legs spread. He rolls his hips and groans like he hasn't been fucked for months, and Rob couldn't stop this even if he wanted to.

There are voices, familiar but foreign, nearby. Approaching. They filter into Rob's consciousness like he's being woken from a dream, just audible beyond the sounds of friction and moans at first, then his ears are attuned to them and he digs his fingers into Felipe's back to get him to stop. Familiar but foreign. European. German.

Felipe doesn't stop, or even slow down. He grinds against the hardness he can feel in Rob's jeans, wanton moans spilling from his open mouth, only adding a guttural growl when fingernails bite into his back, gripping Rob's shoulders painfully hard in kind.

The voices grow ever closer to Rob's increasing alarm, and when he murmurs a gruff but urgent _Felipe!_ they abruptly fall silent. Felipe's moans seem louder than ever, defiantly so, and they fill his ears along with the rustle of clothing and hammering of his own heart. He peers out from behind Felipe's undulating body, staring wide eyed and flushed faced into the near darkness, unsure if he's imagining the familiar, slim figure looking back at him from between the bushes. He stares, the colour staining his face deepening.

Felipe comes, choking on his moans, hands fisted in Rob's thick hair. Rob can't guess how long it has been since the man first appeared, but as Felipe's spasms ebb and fade, the silhouette shrinks back, his shape merging with the rest of the shadows. Rob blinks repeatedly, trying to make his eyes see in the dim light, but the trees and bushes rustle in a gentle breeze and Rob wonders if he ever saw anything at all.

He looks up to Felipe, whose head is rolled back on his shoulders, a satin sheen of sweat catching the light across his exposed throat while he catches his breath. Felipe lifts his head and looks down as though he feels Rob's gaze on him. The fire of before has burned out and his usually warm, chocolate eyes look black and dull.

Felipe rolls off him and sits in a slightly untidy heap at his side. Rob sits forward, feeling an uncomfortable twinge in his lower back, his unspent cock just beginning to soften in his jeans. He stares at his feet for a while. Distantly, he hears laughter.

He presses the back of his hand to his cheek, feeling that it has begun to cool. "D'you wanna go back to the hotel?" he asks quietly.

It takes a long moment for Felipe to reply, and even when he does it's not so much a reply as silent assent. He pushes himself unsteadily to his feet and brushes off his backside, picks woodchips from his knees and offers his hand. Rob takes it and pulls himself up. As they retrace their steps along the gravel path, Rob keeps a subtle eye out for their observer to no avail. Felipe's eyes remain on the ground.

 

It's a melancholy silence that follows them to Rob's hotel room door, one only broken when Felipe asks if he can come in. Once he's closed the door behind them, he leans heavily against it and closes his eyes.

Rob thinks about asking Felipe who gave him a bloodied nose, but since neither Massimo nor Luca C have been blowing his phone up trying to get hold of him, it might not be the worst case scenario that Rob is dreading.

 _Shall I stick the telly on?_ Rob thinks about asking instead, but then he thinks that it's his room and he can do what he likes. And the silence is starting to eat away at him.

Felipe cracks an eye open at the sudden invasion of noise, and he watches the screen for a few moments before he pushes away from the door. "I need to piss," he states, and doesn't bother to close the bathroom door once he's inside.

Rob heaves a slow sigh and rubs his eyes. His attention is pulled by a brief, glossy advert for some sports programme; it mentions the return of the US grand prix and its winner, and little else. They don't get a mention. Maybe there wasn't time. Maybe nobody cares. The world moves on without them.

He glances around to see Felipe leaning against the wall having finished in the bathroom, impassive gaze on the television. He's drying his hands - no, in fact, he's holding the fluffy white towel in loose fists. Like he's forgotten it's there.

"You staying?" Rob asks, bringing Felipe's attention to him.

"You want me to stay?" Felipe's reply isn't incredulous; it's a genuine question.

"I'd like you to, yeah."

Felipe half-twists and tosses the towel back into the bathroom. For a moment Rob isn't sure if Felipe's just going to leave anyway, and the weight of relief sinks surprisingly heavily in his stomach when Felipe approaches the bed. He seats himself at his side, appearing to consciously leave about a foot of space between them.

There's a slight heaviness to Felipe's eyelids that suggest he hasn't quite sobered up yet, and it could explain some of the dull glaze in his eyes, but it doesn't make it any easier to see.

"I think maybe in Brazil they talk about what happened more," Felipe says, and he smiles; it's not the same pinched smile he was parading around the dancefloor earlier, but it's there and gone, like it pained him to muster it. He looks at the burgundy carpeted floor. "Maybe they were even nice about me!"

"Since when do you give a fuck about what people say, eh kidda?" Rob responds with a gentle smile and a gentler elbow in the ribs, trying to catch Felipe's eye without success. Felipe doesn't even acknowledge him.

Rob lets out another slow sigh. He lays a hand on Felipe's shoulder and squeezes lightly, then lifts it to tuck a stray strand of dark hair behind his ear. He turns his head back to the television, to colours and movement and noise that he can't make himself focus on.

"I never told you this," he begins, a soft lilt of something approaching enquiry in his voice. "Not long after Hockenheim--" and he doesn't feel the need to clarify _which_ Hockenheim-- "I had a funny dream. Not funny, but y'know. I was in a hotel or something, at the end of a long corridor, really, really long. And I was frightened. I was frightened to be where I was, but I was frightened to go anywhere else. So I started walking down the corridor, and every step I took, I got more scared. But I couldn't stop and I couldn't go faster." Rob moves his unfocused gaze away from the screen and back to Felipe, wondering if he's even listening. It's hard to tell, but he carries on anyway. "I got to the door at the end and it was open a little bit. My heart was pounding away, just from looking at this gap in the door, it was so fucking strange. I pushed it open and you and Fernando were on the bed. Both in clothes, and you were kneeling over him. And you had your hands around his throat."

Felipe reacts minimally to this - Rob even pauses briefly to allow him time to digest it - but he simply turns his head slightly more in Rob's direction. He doesn't lift his gaze. Rob continues.

"He wasn't struggling, he wasn't even moving. Neither were you. You were just looking at each other like nothing was happening, and I saw your hands were so tight they were shaking, and his face was getting redder and redder."

He's looking down at his own stiff arm, the hand open but taut, fingers tight around an invisible throat. Felipe's looking at that clawed hand too, he notices out of the corner of his eye; as he allows his arm to relax, Felipe's eyes meet his, studying him, a slight frown breaking through his expressionless mask.

"I woke up because I couldn't get my breath," Rob says. "Lucy thought I was having a fucking asthma attack or something."

"You were okay?"

"Yeah," Rob replies in the midst of a quiet sigh. "Just...gasping. My heart was fucking hammering."

"Is crazy," Felipe murmurs contemplatively, with a small shake of his head. "I never do this."

"I know you wouldn't," Rob replies. _Not to him anyway_ , he adds inwardly, and quickly extinguishes the thought. It doesn't help. Nothing does.

He begins to stroke Felipe's hair, a gentle palm and threading fingers serving as much to soothe Felipe as himself, and he shifts closer to kiss his scarred temple, the muss of his hair, the shell of his ear, stopping to nuzzle against the side of Felipe's head.

"I love you. You were fucking fantastic today and a proper fucking fighter, and I love you." He says the words as firmly and passionately as he ever has done, the fire of his conviction bright and strong as it burns away in his chest. He pulls back and turns Felipe's face fully towards him with a finger and thumb on his chin, because he won't be denied Felipe's gaze, not now, however wrenchingly empty it is. "Okay?"

Felipe blinks slowly a couple of times, a clarity beginning to break through the dullness in his eyes. "No."

Rob feels his scalp prickle, something cold and dreadful and something that feels a hell of a lot like fear shooting through him. What? _No what?_

A small crease appears between Felipe's eyebrows, a fractional change in expression at first, then, like the ground giving way in a landslide, his face begins to crumple. "Is not okay."


	2. If I Lose Everything In The Fire

"Come here," Rob says softly, insistent as he slides his arm around Felipe's shoulders and pulls him into a hug. Felipe lets him, but not for very long; with his face pressed into the crook of Rob's neck, he seems to hold his breath, one hand gripping Rob's thigh like it's helping him hold everything back, to smash it all down inside himself like Rob's seen him do before, and then he pulls far enough out of Rob's embrace to kiss him, soft and slow but no less intense than the searing, urgent kisses outside the bar. Rob's arms relax, and Felipe pushes him away. He wipes his eyes roughly, as though the dampness there is intrusive, and he wipes them again when the first wipe isn't enough.

"Felipe..." Rob murmurs, and he doesn't quite know what he's going to say next. He doesn't get chance to think about it too deeply because Felipe's hands are swift in motion, they unbutton his shirt to halfway down his stomach, then drop to his belt buckle. Rob dumbly watches him work, fingers flexing, grasping nothing but air; the words _you don't have to_ threaten to escape him, instinctively soothing and facile, but the expression Felipe wears is like worn out armour and Rob can't bring himself to shatter it. Felipe draws Rob's zip down and clambers over him, pushing him onto his back while he delves into his open jeans. His hips twitch at the first touch, and Felipe's lips meet his to take his muffled moan.

The build-up is swift, pent-up arousal rushing back up into him, Felipe knowing exactly how to work him even through his briefs and doing so until his breathing is ragged. Then he's fighting his way out of his jeans and kicking them onto the floor because it isn't enough, spreading his thighs for Felipe to fit himself between them. Felipe would normally bite back a grin and tease him for being impatient, or murmur something dirty and promising that would make him choke on his breath, or laugh, or do all three, but not tonight. Tonight Felipe is quiet, methodical, lost to the thoughts Rob can't chase away. Tonight he isn't the Felipe he loves so dearly. Tonight they are not normal.

Felipe sucks on his fingers and reaches underneath Rob, tugging his briefs down to expose his ass and rubbing slick fingertips over his entrance. Rob presses his head back into the bed, shivering at the touch. "S'good," he pants, cupping the back of Felipe's neck when he bends to drip kisses along his jaw. "Feels so g--" he is cut off with a full, deep kiss, his moan bleeding out when Felipe pushes those fingers deep into him and begins to fingerfuck him.

His sweet spot is found and lavished with attention to the exclusion of almost everything else. Rob is reduced to a writhing, moaning, cursing mess, colour flushing his skin right down his neck and stars bursting in his head. "Oh, fucking yes, Felipe, fuck..." he gasps, grabbing clumsily at the bedcovers, and he looks down to the man between his legs, dizzied and craving some sort of response. Felipe is silent, a few curls of hair hanging out of place, looking down as he works. He sets his teeth into his bottom lip when he slightly changes the angle of his arm, fingers scissoring over the sweet spot and drawing a more hoarse, shuddering moan from Rob in the process; it's a noise Felipe is very familiar with, one that he often seeks to hear when they're tangled in each other, one that makes him smile widely, that brings a mischievous sparkle to his eyes. Tonight Felipe leaves a single, brief kiss against the inside of Rob's thigh and nothing more. Increasing concern making for an unwelcome blend with the pleasure throbbing through his veins, Rob watches Felipe. His stomach clenches, the need for more, for Felipe's naked body against his, for that feeling of being filled and fucked and spent, and to ache afterwards, washes over him; when Felipe wraps his other hand around Rob's flushed erection, the older man chokes on his moan.

"Nnn--Stop, _stop stop, don't_ \--" he says, hoarse and desperate, squirming to grip Felipe's arm. Felipe stills and looks him over with some visible confusion.

"Please," Rob whispers, his skin too hot, his half-open shirt clinging to his heaving chest, suddenly a world away from _you don't have to_ and firmly in _I need it, I need you to, I didn't realise how much--_ "Please, I want you, I want _you_."

Felipe regards him impassively. "You want to fuck?"

"I want you to fuck me," Rob says as plainly as he can, undisguised frustration bleeding into his voice as his whole body throbs with arousal. "And I don't want you to do it like you're just returning a fucking favour!"

Felipe blinks and sits back on his thighs, his shoulders sinking a little. "Is only about what you want?," he says quietly, a faint frown settling on his brow, and there's a flash of that resentment from earlier in his eyes.

"You're not the only one who's pissed off, you know," Rob responds rather too sharply, sitting up and looking him in the eye. "And you've been so fucking quiet and shut off that I'm gonna carry on telling you what _I_ want."

He lifts his hand towards Felipe's face. "I want you to get out of there," he urges, tapping Felipe's temple. "I wanna feel good, and I want to make you feel good. I want you to fucking let go." Pausing briefly to take a cleansing breath, his hand drops to the space between Felipe's thighs and rubs him through his jeans, and he leans closer to brush kisses against full lips. "I want this," he murmurs, "And I want you to fuck me with it."

Rob gives a little time to allow the words to settle in, offering a few more of those featherlight kisses, then leans back enough to give Felipe a hard look. "Or you can go back to your room. Because I don't fucking want _this._ "

He sees the flex in Felipe's jaw as he clenches it, the way he presses his lips together, perhaps left sensitive from the gentle attention. Beneath that stubborn frown there's a glimmer of something in his eyes, like the armour might be about to crumble away, but it remains only a glimmer, there and gone.

"Kiss me again like this before," Felipe murmurs, and Rob obliges; lips brush lips in the barest of tastes, Rob's hand starts to work again, and the soft moan that it elicits makes Rob's heart leap.

Felipe begins to breathe more heavily, his thighs spreading wider, welcoming the touch; his heavier breathing wets Rob's lips and he moves in for a deeper taste.

Felipe undoes his belt and opens his jeans, blindly grasping Rob's hand in both of his own and pressing it firmly against himself, and when Rob flexes his fingers around the growing hardness there, he groans.

"I want it," Rob mutters, muffled against Felipe's mouth, his voice rough with the need that's beginning to overtake him. "I want it so fucking badly…" Felipe grunts and bucks his hips, thrusting against Rob's palm. The ebb and flow of arousal in Rob's veins tonight is too much, much too much now after everything this weekend, and he bites at Felipe's full bottom lip. "Fuck me 'til I'm fucking raw, _come on_ \--"

Felipe rises to his knees and peels his jeans and pants down to his thighs, freeing his half hard cock; before he can do anything else, Rob kisses a hurried trail down his stomach, following the trail of hair to the base of his cock, seized by the musk of sex and sweat and Felipe. He takes the growing erection into his mouth, moaning around its length. Felipe makes a noise of surprise, his body tensing, and he takes a tight hold of the mussed hair atop Rob's head. Rob groans again, flexing his tongue when Felipe begins to fuck his mouth. A steady stream of soft moans reach his ears, and the feel of the flesh weighing on his tongue growing harder and hotter makes his head spin with need.

Urgency has the both of them now, and once Felipe loosens his grip on Rob's hair, he squirms to push his jeans down to his ankles and grasps his spit-slicked cock, waiting for Rob to lie back. Rob wipes his wet mouth with the heel of his palm while he gets comfortable, hitching up his knees. "Fucking get in me…"

There's a brief, breathless pause as Felipe opens his legs and shifts closer, and Rob feels the blunt head pressing against his hole. He shuts his eyes, squeezes them shut, a steady stream of curses escaping under his breath. _Fucking get in me_ , he whispers again, urging, desperate, _fucking yes, get in me--_

It burns, and it hurts, and there's that moment when it feels like it's too much for him to take, and it _hurts_ , and he groans tremulously. Felipe eases into him too quickly and it feels so fucking good; Felipe gives him a few seconds to adjust and he doesn't want them. His eyes open and Felipe is looking down at him, still mostly clothed, one hand curled around the top of his thigh to hold him in place. He's about to beg for it when Felipe finally begins to fuck him, deep and fast and exactly the kind of overwhelming he wants. He sees Felipe close his eyes while his hips thrust, his brow still furrowed.

He pulls Rob's legs up onto his shoulders, linking tanned, muscular arms across pale thighs so he can fuck him harder, deeper still. Rob gasps for breath, moaning too loudly, the bed squeaking with every hard thrust. He grips onto the edge of the mattress above his head and Felipe presses him down into the bed, bending him until his hamstrings burn. Felipe's eyes are open now, watching him but still not _there_ , his moans barely audible above Rob's own. Rob dimly realises that he's too far gone to care.

Felipe reaches down and takes fistfuls of Rob's sweat damp shirt in both hands, ripping the remainder of it open to expose his stomach and chest, and slips his arms between Rob's thighs, one hand moving to grip his shoulder, changing the angle of his thrusts so he has one free hand to explore Rob's bared torso; prickles dance up Rob's spine when it strays upwards and lingers over his throat.

His own dark thought comes back to him, whispers to him, _not to him anyway_.

Felipe's eyes meet his and that dream, that fucking dream rolls back into his mind like approaching thunder, that unreadable, empty look on Felipe's face as he choked the life out of Fernando is right there, right above him. _you wouldn't do it. Not to him anyway._ He swallows unconsciously, his Adam's apple bumping Felipe's thumb as it rests against his flushed skin. Staring up at Felipe, something uncurls within him, pitch black and hot, urgent and roaring, _go on then, do it,_ the sudden swell of arousal surging up into him making his moans escalate, _fucking do it, **fucking do it to me** \--_ Then the hand moves away to slide back down his chest. His heart hammers in his chest and he swears under his breath.

Felipe barely has to stroke Rob's cock before he comes, spattering Felipe's shirt and clenching hard around the cock buried deep inside him, arching off the bed.

He's done long before Felipe is. He is sprawled and boneless on the bed, chest heaving while he regains his breath, and Felipe still has him bent in two. The feel of it is too much now, far too much, the rhythmic thrust and withdrawal and the thud of hips against his ass; being filled and fucked with the pleasure ebbing out of him, the burn and stretch while his skin feels too sensitive. Felipe fucks him into the bed, eyes closed again, either chasing pleasure or going through the motions, quiet moans passing his parted lips every so often that are now barely audible above the sound of the television. Rob shuts his eyes and makes an unpleasant noise in the back of his throat. 

He doesn't know how long it is before Felipe stiffens and shudders, but there's the sudden spread of hot wetness inside him as Rob feels him come. Rob groans at the feel of it, running his hands over Felipe's thighs, the weak ripple of pleasure it sets off within him fizzling out because Felipe doesn't even look at him.

Once Felipe is done, he pulls out and shuffles gingerly backwards off the bed, tiredly kicking off the jeans and pants bundled around his ankles, and wordlessly shuffles off to the bathroom. Rob lies there atop the bed, getting steadily colder with his dampened shirt clinging to him but not having it in him to do much about it, and listens numbly to the electric whirring of the shower and the chatter of the TV. He reaches back towards the bedside table, cleaning himself up with a couple of tissues.

Felipe re-emerges from the bathroom with his stained shirt draped over his arm, picking his jeans and underwear off the floor. There is little purpose to his movements. Eventually he dumps his clothes in a single pile by the wardrobe and approaches the bed. His hair is still wet. Rob wants to comb it back with his fingers.

Felipe looks Rob over as he shrugs off his shirt and sweeps a couple of loose buttons onto the floor, his bare, pale flesh prickled with goosebumps. "You should be in the bed."

"Only if you come in with me," Rob replies with a tentative half smile, shifting himself to one side and pulling back the covers. "Warmer when it's both of us."

Felipe hesitates only momentarily, and for the first time that night, he returns the smile, however briefly. He moves around to the empty side of the bed and slips inside, pulling the covers over himself. Rob watches him get comfortable before squirming awkwardly into bed himself, noticing that Felipe smells like his shower gel. It reminds him of early morning showers together, hot, slippery skin and steamed up mirrors. He hugs himself under cool sheets and tries to rub the chill from his arms.

Felipe turns off the TV and reaches up to flick the light switch by their bedside, plunging them into darkness. It takes a little while for his eyes to adjust, but in the dark and the quiet, Rob watches Felipe.

"Just let me be here for you," he says softly, suddenly, his words almost unbidden. "Please, mate."

Felipe looks at him in a way that twists his heart before his gaze flits away and he sighs. Then, he pushes himself up onto one elbow and leans over to his lover, nudging his nose with his own. Rob realises that he wants to be kissed, desperately so, but he will not ask for it, nor will he simply take. Maybe there's a slice of him that wants forgiveness. For anything. Everything. He feels Felipe hovering close to him, and lets the need burn away deep in his chest.

Felipe does not kiss him. Instead, he looks down to Rob's chest and smoothes his hand across the bare skin. His fingertips tickle the hair there, encouraging a fresh ripple of goosebumps. And he speaks.

"Sometimes is like I just have you. Is stupid, you know, I have my mechanics and Matteo and these things, but sometimes...Is just you." His voice grows very quiet. "And sometimes is like I don't have even that."

A pang of helplessness cuts through Rob. "You do," he says softly. He grasps Felipe's hand and brings it to his mouth to decorate it with kisses, before clasping it against his cheek and squeezing it. The memory of being outside the bar earlier that night swirls back into his mind. When he was thinking about the future. Thinking about decisions to make. "You do," he repeats, sounding as certain as he can.

Felipe regards him and says nothing.

Rob shifts across the bed to curl up against Felipe's side, looping an arm around his waist, head coming to rest on his chest when he settles back. Felipe drapes an arm around his shoulders, fingers threading through his thick hair. For a while, that's all there is, all they are; steady breathing and a soothing caress.

"I love you," Felipe says softly. "Really a lot." Even those words, those precious words, sound unhappy. Rob feels the urge to respond in kind, but then it might be seen as a reflex; just a regurgitation to placate. But if he doesn't say it, would that only expose all his uncertainty? He feels utterly disorientated as he suddenly second guesses himself; _just let me be here for you_ , his own words coming back to mock him. He takes a deep breath. _I love you,_ he thinks. _You know I do. And it's not enough right now._

"What happened to your nose, then?" Rob murmurs eventually, looking up at Felipe and stroking his tanned ribs with his thumb. A change of subject. Maybe for the best.

Unconsciously or not, Felipe sniffs and thumbs at his nostril, glancing at the dark crust he's wiped away before he flicks it off the side of the bed. "Is not what you think," he admits. "I go to the bar. For another drink, you know. It was so busy, many people. I try to squeeze in. There was a guy, his arms up, trying to get the attention..." he gestures backwards and downwards with his elbow, and gives a rueful half smile. "I don't think he even notice me."

Relief washes away the last lingering traces of dread inside Rob, something he does his best to disguise. In reality he finds it very difficult to imagine that Felipe would get himself into a punch up, however much he appeared to be spoiling for it earlier in the night, but the reassurance that he was just elbowed in the face by some clumsy pisshead is palpable. "Fucking twat," he mutters, tightening his arm around Felipe's waist. "Him, not you, obviously."

Felipe smiles thinly, tiredly, and nuzzles briefly against the top of Rob's head.

"Interlagos next," Rob reminds him, as though he needs reminding. He wants a glimmer of hope, of positivity for Felipe. It's a fucking cliché but he'd pull a star down from the sky if it would make him happy again. "All those people there for you, just you, shouting your name."

The hand caressing through Rob's hair slows, so he shifts to look back up at Felipe. His eyes are closed, and he lifts his free hand to his face to rub them with his thumb and forefinger. All traces of that smile have disappeared, and he swallows. 

"I do the best for the team," he says quietly when his arm relaxes again, and Rob feels his stomach sink. Felipe points up at the ceiling and offers another unconvincing half smile. "God has His plan."

Rob opens his mouth to speak but finds nothing to say. _Do the best for your people. Do your best for yourself. Do your best for me._ He thinks these things but keeps them to himself. They wouldn't help.

_I do the best for the team._

There is a championship to win.

We are here to win.

We are. As a team.

It doesn't help. Nothing does.

 

\-------

_Interlagos, Thursday._

 

Rob's having a coffee in the motorhome while Felipe's in the drivers' press conference. He's not particularly listening to what's being said as it's broadcast on the many motorhome televisions, until Felipe is brought up in a question to Sebastian. Something about whether he'd like Felipe as a teammate. Rob looks up to see Felipe, sat in the back row, raises his eyebrows in incredulity and glances across at Lewis and Bruno with a grin. Rob stirs his coffee and stifles a sneer. What a fucking question.

Sebastian inevitably makes reference to the gearbox and glances over his shoulder at Felipe. And suddenly Rob is paying much more attention.

"After seeing Felipe in Austin on Sunday night, I'm not sure if he would be a good teammate! No, I'm joking..."

Rob watches Felipe laugh behind his hands. He doesn't really hear the rest of Sebastian's answer.


End file.
